The Healing Power of Sitting With Your Emotions

Though most often advised to “stay positive” or “just move on,” what if the most effective approach to recovery is merely to sit and feel? Sitting with your emotions, especially the unpleasant ones may be the bravest, most therapeutic thing you can do in a society always sprinting to the next diversion.

This does not mean spiraling into despair or being lost in anxiety. It is allowing yourself to accept what you are feeling without regard to judgment, without pressure to change it right now.

Why We Avoid Our Emotions?

To be honest, emotions may be quite horrible. Anger, grief and fear are strong, sometimes erratic, and they often accompany bodily sensations that drive us to want to run away. Many of us have been taught from early life to suppress our feelings. We are advised to “don’t cry” or “be strong” as if emotions were weaknesses to be conquered rather than messages to comprehend. 

Part of the reason we avoid emotions is that they threaten our sense of control. Feeling sadness or vulnerability can make us feel exposed, like we’re at the mercy of something we can’t predict or fix. In a culture that rewards logic, productivity, and “keeping it together,” emotional openness can feel like a personal failure. So we stuff it down, hide it behind sarcasm, or distract ourselves with busyness.

Another reason? We’re not really taught how to feel. Schools teach math and grammar, not how to sit with heartbreak or name what shame feels like in the body. For many people, emotions become this vague, overwhelming fog. And when we don’t have the tools to process what we’re feeling, avoidance becomes a form of self-protection. We don’t reject emotions because we’re heartless, we reject them because we’re unequipped.

Emotions, though, are messengers; they are not issues. That constriction in your chest? That might be unprocessed loss. That need to grab at someone? It could be a deeper sensation of terror or unexpressed frustration. Avoiding emotions merely postpones the mending they’re calling for; it does not eliminate them. 

The Gift of Awareness

Sitting with your emotions opens awareness for you. Rather than stifling grief or acting as though you’re not enraged, you start to wonder about what’s truly going on. You begin to perceive your emotions as aspects of yourself that require attention and care, not as adversaries.

Science backs this up. A study from UCLA found that understanding what we’re feeling reduces activity in the amygdala, the part of the brain that lights up when we feel threatened or in danger, helping us regain a sense of control and calm.

This deliberate emotional awareness exercise could also produce unexpected revelations. You can discover a belief you were unaware of, you were harboring or find that a circumstance from your past is provoking something. And when that occurs, healing becomes possible, not because you have pushed it but rather because you have made place for it. 

How To Sit With Your Emotions?

At first, sitting with your emotions can feel like stepping into a dark room, you don’t know what you’ll find, and a part of you just wants to turn around. It’s uncomfortable. Vulnerable. Even a little scary. But over time, this practice becomes less like punishment and more like a homecoming. The more you face what you feel, the more you realize that your emotions aren’t out to destroy you. They’re just trying to speak.

Here are some practical steps to help you navigate that inner terrain:

• Name it to tame it. A study conducted at George Mason University reveals that accurately labeling our feelings allows us to understand what is happening so we can make a plan to feel better. So, start by identifying what you’re feeling. Is it anger? Sadness? Disappointment? Go beyond “I feel bad” and try to label the emotion or feeling precisely. If it helps, use an emotion wheel or write it out.
• Locate it in your body. Emotions live in the body. Maybe anxiety feels like buzzing in your chest, or sadness sits heavy in your stomach. Noticing these sensations helps ground the feeling and makes it less abstract.
• Breathe through it. When emotions rise, your nervous system may go into overdrive. Deep, slow breaths can regulate your body and create enough space for you to stay with the feeling instead of running from it.
• Validate your experience. Remind yourself: “It’s okay to feel this. It makes sense that I’m feeling this.” You don’t have to agree with the emotion or act on it, but acknowledging its presence is an act of self-respect.
• Get curious, not judgmental. Instead of pushing the emotion away, ask: “What is this feeling trying to tell me? What need might be underneath it?” Often, behind anger is hurt. Behind fear, a longing for safety.
• Don’t rush the process. Emotional awareness isn’t a switch you flip, it’s a muscle you build. The goal isn’t to “fix” what you feel, but to listen long enough to understand it. Usually, emotions flow through us when we cease trying to control them, just like waves do.

Sitting with your emotions is an act of courage. And like most courageous acts, it starts shaky—but eventually, it changes how you relate to yourself.

When to Ask for Help

Sometimes, sitting with emotions brings up things too weighty to carry alone – and that’s good. Seeking therapy is a show of strength rather than weakness if your feelings are controlling your everyday life or seem to be overpowering.

Here is where therapy might be quite transformative. Working with a professional will help you sort through the noise, whether your problems are trauma, anxiety, depression, or simply a matter of mental inertia. Simply looking for cognitive behavioral therapists will help you find someone qualified to assist you in sitting with, understanding, and healing from what you are experiencing. If you are not sure where to start.

Anyway, remember that sitting with your feelings won’t make all the difference overnight. Still, it creates a relationship with oneself based on integrity and compassion. Growth starts here, not by running from your emotions but by listening to them, through letting them. And at last, by respecting them.

Whether you decide to negotiate this process alone or with the help of a psychologist, know this: your feelings are genuine, your recovery is attainable, and sitting with what hurts could just be the first step toward something quite strong and transforming.

References:

Feldman, L. et. Al. (2015) Unpacking Emotion Differentiation Transforming Unpleasant Experience by Perceiving Distinctions in Negativity. Current Directions in Psychological Science; 24(1): 10-16.

Lieberman, M. D. et. Al. (2007) Putting feelings into words affect labeling disrupts amygdala activity in response to affective stimuli. Psychological Science; 18(5): 421-428.